Nat THOMAS

Nathanel Walles THOMAS (known as "Nat"). His first wife was Betty, Bet or Betsy who was aboriginal. After her death in 1878, he married Sophia Newcombe, a white woman, in 1879.

There seems to be several versions of whence he came, and how, and since Betty was a Tasmanian , it seems most probable that his sojourn on the Island started also from that area. Although he appears to have spent most of his time in the Penneshaw/Dudley Pensinsula area, he proved to be very helpful to the officials at Kingscote, including the first manager, Samuel Stephens. .. .his contribution to the early progress of the Island has been adequately recognised by the Association.

At Creek Bay is settled a person named Nat Thomas, who has been on the island 17 years. He has got an excellent farm, and a good house and dairy. He has a herd of 300 goats, and a great number of fowls. A river of excellent water runs the whole year close past his house. At this place there is a considerable extent of good county, and high undulating land in the interior. Nat Thomas has got a native woman who catches wallaby for him. By her he has three very interesting little children, who combine the intelligence of the white with the activity of the native.

' Nat ' was a perfect character ; he had been 32 years on Kangaroo island ; and as geologists find it difficult to account for the disposition of boulders — those erratic wanderers from respectable strata — so it may be a difficult problem to account for the singular life such a man has led. There is not an island or rock on the shores of our province, or in the Australian Bight, nor a bay, creek, river, or lagoon, but he can give you some reminiscence of his visits or residence, of escapes and adventures, and of perils and dangers. He is a compound of sailor, sealer, farmer, and wild man. He possesses all the resources of the sailor, combined with the instincts of the aboriginal native. Place him on the western end of Kangaroo Island, with only a dog and a knife, and he will find his way out at the other — a feat that he has done, I believe, more than once. Nothing comes amiss to him in the way of eating, from a frying pan of young ants to a dish of ' wakeries ' (grubs) ; and he truly argues that a man knows not what he will eat until he is tried. For years he has lived upon wallaby and seals, never seeing the sight of flour. Being such a very old settler, he is of course intimately acquainted with every leading colonist who landed in the early days at Kingscote; and some very singualr tales he can tell. ' Nat ' belongs to a respectable family ; his father having held a lucrative post in the victualling office at home. In his own emphatic language, out of a large family, he was the only ' scabby one,' and as such ran away to sea during the war ; then went whaling ;was wrecked on the island; got away to Sydney; went surveving under King; then took up the life of an islander; that is, went either singly or in a gang sealing; ships coming at irregular periods, and buying the skins: and sopersevering have these men been, that seals are rarely to be met with now on the rocks and islands of our coast; and Kangaroo Island at this time cannot boast of a kangaroo.

REMINISCENCES OF A PIONEER.'John Robert McDonald' writes:—... In the morning we saw smoke rising inland, went ashore, and were met by Nat Thomas and young Nat, and a man named Barlow, who lived in a shanty. Nat's daughter was a very stout woman, and her brother was a fine young fellow, while Betsy, their mother, a Tasmanian native, was there, but she lived outside, and Nat and his white wife and a little girl occupied a separate shanty. W e had a look at his vegetable garden, his windmill— a large coffee mill, with a flour bag attached. He showed a sow and pigs. They were in a sty, and lately captured. He said pigs were numerous, and that the late Sir John Morphett and others came over to hunt them. He had dogs. One of them had been torn by a boar. We had dinner, wallaby pie and vegetables. The wallaby hunter was Betsy. She visited Hog Bay, where Walker and Perkins lived with two aboriginals. The latter had children: Walker had none. ...

A daughter of Nat and Betsy was Mary SEYMOUR (nee THOMAS)

See a detailed treatise written by RebeTaylor in her book "Unearthed - The Aboriginal Tasmanians of Kangaroo Island" Wakefield Press 2008.